Vanquish
by swift176
Summary: When a District 13 spy finds himself trapped in the arena during the seventy-fourth Hunger Games, he must evade attacks from the Gamemakers, avoid the other tributes, and figure out a way to escape and return home. Note: I do not own The Hunger Games.
1. Preface

**Preface**

I wake with a start in an unfamiliar place. Tall pine and spruce and redwood trees tower over me as I lie in a bed of fallen leaves that covers the hard-packed dirt. A forest. The earsplitting echo of a gun firing resonates through the air and silences the sounds of the animals and the chirps of birds. No, it's not a gun. The sound is far away and too loud and low to be a gun. The blast echoes several times before I am able to identify the sound. It's the boom of a cannon. I count the number of shots until I reach eleven. I wonder absently who's firing the cannon and why eleven times. Sunlight slants through the trees at an angle that suggests late afternoon or early evening. I sit up slowly and am surprised to find that my arms and legs are not bound. I notice the marks on my wrists and gingerly stroke the angry red burns that brand my flesh. The scars are painful reminders of the days I spent chained up in the Capitol prison. _The Capitol._

Suddenly, I jump straight up and sprint off in a random direction before they can capture me again. I'm free. The Capitol has released me, and I'm not going to waste this chance to escape. I just need to get back to District 13 quickly and bring them the intelligence I collected in the Capitol. I'm not even sure where I am, but as long as I am free of the Capitol, it doesn't matter. Part of me knows this may be a trap designed to lure me into a false sense of security but the return of my abilities assures that I won't get hurt, that I _can't_ get hurt. Still, it doesn't make sense that they would simply let me go.

My name is Kevin Vanquish. I am a citizen of District 13, the district that the Capitol supposedly destroyed. District 13, forced to move underground and play dead, still thrives and waits for the opportunity to strike the Capitol and overthrow President Snow. I am the best extractor of all the soldiers in our small army, stealing classified information and freeing captive rebels from right under the Capitol's nose. Most damaging of all, my mother is Dr. Ava Levin, the chief scientist in charge of the Capitol's failed scientific venture, Project Vanquish.

I tear through the piney woods at speeds no ordinary person could dream of matching until the ground slopes up out of the valley. Without hesitating, I spring upwards through the trees and fly until the woods lie one hundred feet below me. As I soar through the air, I look down at the ground and see a dry, empty plain and a deep blue lake that border the sparse forest where I woke up. Near the lake is a big golden structure like a horn that looks slightly familiar. I'm still gazing at the golden horn when I fly right into a force field. The electric shock jolts my entire body and burns through my veins like a terrible fire that can't be extinguished. The force of the invisible barrier thrusts me away, and I'm blown straight backwards, spiraling and tumbling until I crash into the hard, unmerciful ground. I fall on my back, and my head slams against the earth with a loud crack. The impact of the crash creates a deafening _boom_ that reverberates throughout the area and knocks the air from my lungs.

For a few minutes, I just lie there on the ground, too drained to move. After a while, I stand up slowly, bracing a nearby tree for support, and try to catch my breath. I fell near the edge of the woods, and I look out across the open stretch of ground I saw from the sky. The lake is right across from me. I glance around the area until I spot the golden horn close to the lake. Now that I'm closer I know why the horn seemed so familiar. It's the Cornucopia. I've seen it on television every year for as long as I can remember. Horror fills my entire being as I finally realize where I am.

I'm in the Hunger Games.


	2. Day 1

**1**

I start running again. Not as fast as before my discovery but at a brisk human pace because I'm still in shock. Of all the grisly torture devices and methods the Capitol has contrived, the Hunger Games are by far the worst. Though the Games are gruesome and harrowing, they are effective at fulfilling their purpose: keeping the twelve districts in line. The districts in Panem have been quiet and subservient for seventy-four years, willingly sending their children to the slaughter and watching them die on live television. There hasn't been a single rebellion since the Dark Days. But we in District Thirteen are trying to change that. We wait for the day when the Capitol pushes the districts too hard, and they decide to fight back. After nearly seventy-four years, we know the day will come soon, but until then, we can only prepare the rebel forces and determine the moods in the districts.

Gauging the moods in the districts is part of my job as an extractor. I've been to every district, except 12, many times to observe the people's levels of dissatisfaction and anger. Assimilating in a district is nearly impossible—which is why I've never gone to 12; it's the tiniest district in Panem—but with my abilities, I'm the only one in 13 who can get in and out without being spotted. This goes for the Capitol, too.

Except for the last time I visited, which was right before I was captured and tossed into the arena.

I continue moving swiftly through the woods, cutting through the trees and swatting away low-hanging branches. I stop when I come across a small pond of cool, clear water. I bend down to drink, and the tall reeds surrounding the pond hide my location from anyone passing by. I cup my hands and fill them with water. Before I take a sip, I decide to be cautious and treat the pond water for germs. I focus on the water in my hands until small beams of energy appear in my palms. The blue beams are small and perfectly round like marbles, but they are hot enough to heat the water cupped in my hands. They only take ten seconds to boil the water, and I withdraw the energy back into my body before the water evaporates. I let it cool a little and then slowly take a sip. Though still warm, the water refreshes my parched throat and clears my head.

This is one of the benefits of being a genetically-altered superhuman. Enhanced speed, strength, the ability to fly, and white-hot energy blasts that shoot from our hands and can kill a dozen men with a single shot. We were built this way so that we did not have to carry weapons. We _were _the weapons. We were designed to be the ultimate killing machines. This was the Capitol's ideal Peacekeeper. That was the reason they sunk so much money into my mother's project. It's also the reason she wanted out.

Before I was born, my mother worked for the Capitol. She specialized in gene therapy, manipulating the genetic code in DNA to cure hereditary diseases. She discovered a pattern of chromosomes that when applied to humans gave them immense physical strength, speed, and stamina. In addition to heightened abilities and senses, the chromosomal arrangement perfected the human immune system. My mother uncovered a cure for disease—not just cancer or the common cold but for _every _known disease and probably the unknown ones, too. When she reported her findings to the Capitol, they placed as her head scientist of an assignment they called Project Vanquish. The Capitol told her they named the assignment Project Vanquish because they wanted to "vanquish"all illnesses. But they really wanted to use the chromosome pattern my mother found to convert their Peacekeepers into superhuman enforcers of the law. When my mother learned that the Capitol wanted to use her discovery to tighten their grip on the already oppressed districts, she defected and took all the information regarding the project, which cost them all the money they had put into funding the project and the technology to create genetically-enhanced superhuman soldiers. I am one of them.

I repeat this process until my thirst is fully quenched. I haven't had water since I was locked up in the Capitol prison, and even then, it was used for waterboarding, not drinking. I shudder slightly at the memory and glance at my reflection in the water's surface. The force field really messed me up. The electricity singed tufts of my dark red hair and when I run my fingers through it, they disintegrate in my hands. I keep sifting out the loose strands until I'm sure I caught them all. The hair still falls in my eyes and sits just above my shoulders, so I don't see a huge difference in its length. Usually, soldiers in District Thirteen shave their heads completely, but when they tried to do this when I was a kid, I ripped all the scissors in two and wrecked all the razors because I didn't want a haircut. They let me keep my hair in exchange for promising not to destroy any more equipment. Besides the damage to my hair, I don't find any serious injuries. The white shirt the Peacekeepers dressed me in is completely charred, so I rip it off and use it to scrub the dirt and ashes from my arms and chest.

For the first time since I realized where I was, I wonder what the hell I'm going to do. I had nothing coming into the arena but the clothes on my back and half of them are useless now. No food, no weapons, no supplies at all. That leaves me with nothing but a pair of baggy brown shorts to survive the Hunger Games. Great. I decide to get off the ground because I have no idea where the cameras are and don't really want any screen time. I straddle the nearest tree and climb all the way to the top. From there I jump to a nearby tree that's taller than the first and ascend that one until I reach the highest point. I continue tree-hopping until I'm at least 200 feet up. I don't know if there are cameras in the trees or if they can zoom in on me from the ground, but I know that no tribute can reach this high.

I lean my head against the slim trunk of the tree and try to sort through what I know about my situation. I am trapped by force fields on all sides. The cannon that woke me up earlier today is the cannon that announces the tributes' deaths. I counted at least eleven shots, so that's eleven dead tributes. This is the first day, and I must have slept through the massacre at the Cornucopia because none of the following days have as many deaths as the first. Eleven dead. Thirteen left.

Suddenly, I remember the Cornucopia by the lake, shining bright gold with its horn filled with supplies. Before I can stop to rethink my decision, my feet carry me from branch to branch in the direction of the Cornucopia. It takes a little longer to get back because I'm famished. The last meal I had was a stale roll, fed to me by a prison guard. Eventually, I reach the open field where the Cornucopia stands, the ground around the golden horn still spattered with blood from the morning brawl. I'm about to drop to the foot of the horn and root through it when I see a group of people gathered near it.

I move in closer, staying hidden in the trees, and take a closer look. Seven people huddle near the golden horn, four boys and three girls. Almost all of the tributes assembled here are solidly built and well-fed. These are probably kids from wealthier districts like 1, 2, and 4. They are the Career Tributes, the ones trained since childhood to compete in the Games and who believe that winning them is a great honor. These tributes often band together during the Games and hunt down the others, so seeing a pack of this size is not surprising. Many of them have blood on their clothes and bodies, but I realize that the blood is from the tributes they've killed. From what I can see, only one is truly injured, a stocky blond blue-eyed boy with bruises on his face, his arm in a bandage, and a slight limp.

I know I'm too late to pick through the supplies because the Career Tributes are moving all the crates and burlap sacks to a camp a short distance away from the Cornucopia. While the others transport the supplies to their camp by the lake, one bony pale-skinned boy digs for something in the dirt. I look closer at the boy burrowing in the ground and noticed that he's digging up the land mines set beneath the starting circular platforms the tributes stand on before the start of the Games. The Gamemakers deactivate the mines after the gong sounds to begin the Games, so they are unusable now. I watch as the boy unearths one land mine, carries it to a specific location near the pyramid of supplies the Careers are building, restarts the mine, and buries it carefully in the dirt. He does this for each of the twenty-four land mines and places them far enough apart that setting off one won't trigger the other mines. I can't deny that I am impressed. No one had ever thought of doing what that boy did before. I assume that he is from District Three since they specialize in electronics for the Capitol.

After securing their provisions, the Careers begin to arm themselves. The Cornucopia has provided them with a large cache of weapons, and the Careers make use of almost all of them. One ruthless-looking boy arms himself with a short, heavy sword, while a girl with dark, choppy hair lines the inside of her black jacket with an assortment of deadly knives. Another girl with flowing blonde hair and bright green eyes equips a silver bow and sheath of arrows. The injured blond boy takes a knife and a spear. The Careers leave the boy from District Three to guard their supplies and set off to track down the other tributes.

After the Careers leave, I move in closer to the pyramid and search for where they stored the food. The land mines are a perfect defense against animals and the other tributes, but they won't prevent me from pilfering their supplies. I inch closer to the pyramid and float down where the boy won't see me. I mean to get out of there quickly, so I only take a sack of apples, some strips of dried beef, a packet of crackers, and a bottle of water. I clamber up a tall tree and dig into my stolen goods. I probably should conserve some of it since I don't know how long I'll be stuck here, but I'm so hungry that I break down and eat all of the food I swiped. I curse my bottomless appetite but justify the meal because I can get more in the forest. The woods are alive with the sounds of life—and by _life _I mean _food_. I hear squirrels clambering up the trunks of trees, wild turkey gobbling on the ground, and rabbits sniffing. I can find all of them tonight. I decide that it's better if I stay in the trees during the day and hunt at night when the tributes won't see me.

I sit still in the branches of the pine tree, trying to understand the Capitol's motives. The truth is I can't see any logical reason behind locking me up in the arena. If they wanted to keep me contained, why didn't they just leave me in my cell? Why bring me into the arena at all? Also, conveying me into the arena while the Hunger Games are taking place seems especially foolish. If I'm onscreen at all anytime during the Games, all of Panem will be wondering who I am and what I'm doing there. They can't display me on television without revealing who I am. If they do, this will force District 13 to expose its existence to the entire nation and may trigger the nuclear war that the Capitol was so desperate to prevent nearly seventy-five years ago. They're taking quite a few risks just to keep me confined in this arena, and I can't see any benefits.

I can't understand any of this, and I wish I could talk to someone who could help me make sense of all this. My mother would know what to do, if she were here…

The thought hits me instantly like the flip of a switch, and it's so obvious I wonder why I didn't think of it sooner. In addition to unparalleled speed, strength, and laser hands, the genetic code gives the brain the power of telepathy. Soldiers with her chromosome pattern can communicate with each other without enemies overhearing or even knowing that they were exchanging information and strategizing their next attack. That was the Capitol's hope anyway, but this trait didn't take with most of the people recruited to be a part of the project. I am the only one with the ability; however, this doesn't render it a useless skill.

With this talent I can contact anyone anywhere by projecting thoughts to them. I think of what I would say to someone if he were standing right next to me, and he can hear what I'm thinking in his mind. The telepathy is limited in that interaction is one-way. I must be the one to initiate communication; no one can contact me in this way. Despite this one limitation, the ability is extremely useful for transmitting information instantly. This is why I am the best extractor in the whole district. I can relay entire files of secret material, images, even conversations that I overhear back to the leaders of District Thirteen immediately and without the Capitol knowing.

I had tried calling for help using telepathy in the Capitol prison, but it didn't work. The Peacekeepers injected some kind of light blue serum into my veins, and this serum apparently nullified my powers. Besides sending for help, I want to ask my mother about the mysterious blue liquid.

_Mom, can you hear me?_

I send the thought out and wait for a reply. The response is faint at first, but then I hear her mind more clearly.

_Kevin! Thank goodness you're all right. We were all worried about you!_ _What happened? Where are you? Are you hurt? _

She continues on in this manner for several minutes and I can't get a thought in edgewise. I know she worries about me, but I think it's kind of unnecessary. If she worries this much about a kid who can't get hurt, can't get sick, and can't get in trouble, I shudder to think how much concern she'd have for me if I were ordinary. But I can understand why she worries considering what I was like when I was younger.

_Mom! _I interrupt, _I'm fine. Have you guys been watching the Games?_

_Yes, we have them on right now. Why? What's going on? You were supposed to come home three days ago. Where are you?_

Three days… That's how long I was in the Capitol. They caught me on the day I was returning to 13 and locked me in prison. I didn't have any way of telling how much time had passed while I was in there.

_I'm in the Hunger Games, Mom._ _I'm trapped in the arena. _

I wait for a reply, but all I hear is her stunned silence. Finally, I catch some sort of response, but her thoughts are so chaotic and jumbled that I can't understand them. After I give her time to process, she begins to recover her coherency.

_That's not funny, Kevin. Tell me where you are. Do we need to send a hovercraft? _

I know why she's having a hard time believing me. Trapping me in the arena is risky both for 13 and the Capitol, but I need to prove to her that I'm here or I'll never escape.

_I'm telling the truth. I swear!_ _What's showing on the screen right now?_

_Um, the cameras are following the kids from the top districts, mostly 1 and 2. Sometimes they show the girl from 12, but she's just walking through the woods… Oh wait! They just cut to their camp at the lake. There's nothing but the boy from District 3, though._

_There will be. Trust me._

As she thinks of what's playing on the screen, I see a vision of the lake and the pyramid of supplies and the Cornucopia looming in the background. I jump off the branch I'm standing on and fly in the direction of the lake. I hope they keep the cameras on the camp a little longer or at least until I get there. I need them to show I'm here. I skim the tops of the trees, and the leaves brush roughly against my skin. While I'm at the Career camp, I should look for a shirt or some kind of covering. I reach the lake seconds later and land in a tree a stone's throw from the golden horn.

_Are they still showing the lake? _I ask.

_Yes, but I think they might cut to something else soon. Not much is happening… What the-?_

I listen to my mother's confusion as I blast one of the mines the boy from District 3 set. An earsplitting explosion echoes over the dry plain while dust and dirt billow up in thick clouds from the ground. I use the cover of dust to slip into the plain undetected. I hover a few feet in front of the Cornucopia and summon the blue energy to my right hand. I point my index finger and use the energy to carve my initials into the golden horn. I position them diagonally to each other and sear the letters directly onto the Cornucopia. The letters cover a large section of the front. Impossible for the cameras to miss or ignore. I even make sure to write them neatly, as if they are typed on paper instead of scorched into the gold, that way my mother will know that no tribute did this. Once I finish, I dart behind the pyramid and rummage for some clothes, but the clouds of dirt dissipate quickly and force me to leave empty-handed. I rush back to my tree near the Cornucopia and admire my handiwork.

KV

Not only do I see my sign with my own eyes but through my mother's thoughts as well. She associates the letters with fear and anxiety because now she knows that I'm telling the truth. I start moving deeper into the forest, keeping to the branches of the trees. I just gave my location away to the Gamemakers, and I'm not going to wait around here for them to strike.

_Do you believe me now? _I think quietly.

_Oh, Kevin… Now you've done it. Claudius Templesmith is puzzling over what "KV" means. _

She's right. I can hear Claudius Templesmith babbling on the meaning of "KV" through her thoughts.

"Killer Venom? Kick Vices? I don't have a clue what it is. Is this a sign from the Gamemakers?" Templesmith blathers on in this manner, but I ignore him.

_What happened? _she asks.

I recount what I remember about being caught—the Capitol prison and the blue serum—and how I woke up this afternoon in the middle of the seventy-fourth Hunger Games.

_I can't get out. _

The last thought is colored by sadness, and my throat tightens as my situation worsens. Night will fall soon. I still have no supplies and no idea how to escape. What's worse is that although my mother and probably all of District 13 know I'm here, the Gamemakers know I am, too. They may choose to retaliate with every weapon in their arsenal, and the devices in the arena are deadly enough to harm even me. Perhaps that is the reason they tossed me in the arena. They needed that serum to subdue me in the Capitol; in the arena, they have everything they need to kill anyone.

_Blue serum… What shade of blue was it? Was it light blue? Like your energy blasts?_ my mother asks.

_Yes, how did you know that?_

_Because I invented it. _

Her thoughts have a worried undertone.

_It's called nihilium. It neutralizes the effect of the genetic enhancements. It takes away your powers. _

She invented it… then why does the Capitol have it?

_You told me you destroyed all the data from Project Vanquish. _

She explains that she couldn't erase all the records from the Capitol's databases, so she took the one piece of information the project was based on: the chromosome pattern. She stole the formula back and deleted all the copies. Without that, Project Vanquish couldn't continue and was shut down, to the Capitol's dismay.

_I guess I forgot about the nihilium formula…_

_Why did you make that anyway? _I ask, _A cure to the cure for all disease?_

_When we started the project, I was looking for a way to isolate the genes that boosted the immune system, but the Capitol was so eager for human trials that I didn't have time to find that pattern. Instead, I created the nihilium as a fail-safe if things ended badly. _

What she's saying is clear and logical. If you give people that much power, you need a way to subdue them or they'll go mad with power.But it weighs heavily on my mind. Suddenly, I think of something, a question that may bring up pain from the past, and I ask it before I can stop myself.

_Why didn't you use it on me? You know, when I was little?_

I can feel her cringe internally at the inquiry, and the hurt and shame in her thoughts are palpable. I regret the question instantly. Even after so many years, my parents cannot think of the Incident without reawakening feelings of anguish, sorrow, and regret. My mother's answer is choked with sobs, as if she is crying in her thoughts.

_We didn't have any and it—it's very hard to make. We didn't have the necessary materials or enough power to run the nuclear reactor. But that means the Capitol can't produce much of it, either. They haven't touched their reactor since the Dark Days. _

She manages to compose herself and hides any remaining pain from her thoughts, so I propose my theory of why the Capitol trapped me in the arena.

_I think that's the reason they put me in here. They ran out of the serum but still wanted to keep me contained, so they tossed me in the arena where I can't escape. _

_Wait, they had you somewhere else before the arena? _she asks.

Crap, she put two and two together which will only make her worry more.

_They held me in one of their prisons in the Cap—_ I start to answer, but she interrupts.

_And they used the nihilium on you? Kevin, did they hurt you? What did they do? Did they—oh Kevin… _

Her string of questions ends in sobs, and I try to get a thought in to comfort her. I finally manage to calm her down and convince her that they only kept me knocked out on nihilium because I know she can't handle the truth. Stripping me of my abilities wasn't the only thing they did; it was just required for what they really wanted to do. They couldn't torture me if I was invulnerable. I shake my head to clear them of the too vivid memories and ask what I know is probably impossible.

_So, what am I supposed to do? _ _Can you guys get me out?_

I know it's a long-shot, and my mother must know it, too. But she still answers with a tone that doesn't crush my hopes immediately.

_I don't know, Kevin. If it weren't this year's arena… then maybe, but we can't launch a frontal assault on the arena, especially while the Games are going on._

So, that's it. The rebels in District 13 were my only hope of getting out, and now that hope is shot to hell. The problem isn't even getting out of the arena. The Games won't last forever, and I know I'll leave here eventually. The trouble is how to escape the Capitol's clutches. When I leave the arena, it will only happen because the Capitol has somewhere worse to transport me. If I can't figure out a way to escape before the Games end, then I'll spend the rest of my life trapped under the Capitol's control with a nihilium IV in my arm. I'm racking my brains for a way to break out when my mother suddenly gives me the solution.

_I'll arrange a meeting with President Coin and see if we can't do something. In the meantime, talk to Plutarch. He may be able to help you get out of there, _she thought.

Plutarch! I honestly forgot about him. He's one of our contacts in the Capitol and a Gamemaker. If anyone can get me out of this arena, Plutarch Heavensbee is my best bet.

_Right. I'll talk to him soon. He can probably help. _

This is the hardest part of telepathic chats with my mother. Hanging up.

_I'll talk to you soon, _I promise.

She realizes that I'm trying to end the conversation, so she—like any mother—throws in a thousand pieces of last-minute advice in an attempt to prolong our talk.

_Okay. Be careful. Don't do anything to attract the cameras. Make sure you eat enough. But don't eat too much! Save some of the food for the tributes. And find a way to keep warm at night. You can expect some cold nights. Oh, and—_

_All right! Got it!_ I interrupt.

She sighs inwardly.

_Okay. Stay safe. I love you, Kevin._

_Love you, too. Don't worry. I'll be fine. _

With that parting line, I sever our minds' connection and prepare for my first night in the arena.


	3. Night 1

**2**

I keep moving through the forest, jumping silently across the trees from the highest branches. As I descend deeper into the valley, I shoot squirrels scaling the trunks of trees and large birds perched in the upper branches with small needles of energy from my fingertips. If I aim these needles precisely, I can bring down a man with one shot to the vitals although I've never tried. I catch the bodies of my prey before they fall too close to the ground and stow them in my sack. I can't afford to stop and cook them now. The Gamemakers could strike at any time, but they can only attack if I stay still. Thanks to my afternoon nap, I have tons of staying power. I can keep roaming for at least another sixteen hours before I need to rest. Maybe by then I'll be cured of this splitting headache.

After the lengthy psychic talk with my mother, my head feels like it's been trampled by elephants and crushed in a vise. Another drawback of the telepathy is that I can't have too many conversations in one day. Once I made three separate calls in six hours, and after the third call, I wanted to bury my head in an iceberg just to relieve the intense ache in my brain. I rub my temple and try to soothe the pain, but it does little to alleviate the throbbing in my head.

The muted orange twilight gives me an estimate on the time. Evening is falling. I wonder how the tributes are faring on their first day. Eleven are already dead, so the Gamemakers will probably leave them alone for tonight. The Capitol has enjoyed enough killing for one day. Which means the Gamemakers will have plenty of time to antagonize me. If they can catch me. The looming threat of the Gamemakers makes me move forward with an extra burst of speed.

I continue down the deep slope into the seemingly endless valley for another half-hour or so, still clutching my game bag. Even though I can keep moving for more than half a day, I start thinking about stopping to take a break. The headache makes concentrating on anything difficult, and I'm hungry again. I bag a few more squirrels before launching myself into a nearby spruce tree.

Suddenly, I spot a girl on the ground hacking at a tree with a knife.

"Whoa!"

She catches me off guard, and I stop so abruptly that I fall out of the tree. I drop to a lower branch, grab it, and swing to the next tree before the girl sees me. I stay hidden in the foliage of a giant cedar, not even daring to breathe, for a few minutes. Once I'm sure it's safe, I turn around and peer at the girl from behind the trunk. She scratches away at the external bark of a sturdy pine tree and scrapes off a generous handful of the soft inner bark. I watch her replace the knife in her belt and slowly gnaw the bark scrapings as she walks.

I don't need to hear her thoughts to know what she's doing. She's a hunter. I can tell just by looking at her. The way she studies the woods surrounding her—tracking potential game—her silent tread through the forest, and the fact that she knows what the forest has to offer in ways of food are all indicators that she's a veteran hunter and she knows how to kill. The only reason I notice all these things is that I can hunt, too.

Back in District Thirteen, we ration the amount of food we eat because we can only grow so much underground. The people in charge of dividing the food based on a person's height, weight, etc. always have a hard time satisfying my voracious hunger without leaving the rest of the district to starve. Sometimes I think they only let me travel to the Capitol so I can eat my fill of their endless bounty of food instead of gathering any useful intelligence.

I was content to eat what they could spare, but I jumped on any leftovers they gave me like a wild animal. Luckily, my father rectified the situation by asking President Coin's permission to let me out of the district to hunt in the nearby woods. She took some convincing, but eventually she allowed it. Hunting was the perfect solution, and I was good at it. I was faster and stronger than any animal in the forest, and I could catch and kill my prey without any weapons. I ate what I caught until I was satisfied and brought the rest back to the district. Soon, the district was eating better—we hadn't had fresh meat in I don't know how long—and I wasn't starving myself to prevent a famine.

Perhaps it's because I haven't seen another person who isn't a Peacekeeper in over three days, but I decide to follow the girl. She's not that hard to miss with the bright orange glow-in-the-dark backpack she's carrying. As she continues her trek through the forest, I study her more closely, trying to place her in a district. She wears a thin, black jacket like all the other tributes, but something bright and gold is pinned onto hers. I look closer and see a miniature gilded mockingjay encased in a circle of gold. The pin must be her district token, but mockingjays are found in many of the districts, so the pin doesn't narrow it down much. Slim build, olive skin tone, dark hair tied in a single braid down her back, gray eyes. And somehow she learned how to hunt. No one in Districts 1, 2, 3, 4, 8, 9, or 11 could learn to do that; either the locations of the districts aren't suited for hunting or they are too strict to allow the citizens to get away with it. Eventually, I eliminate 7 and 10 as well. District 7 has plenty of forests—their main export is lumber—but their dense woods are full of people and near deforestation, not really fitting for hunting. District 10 is pretty large, but most of their lands are open fields for raising their cattle, so hunting can't work there either. That leaves 5, 6, and 12.

The girl sets two twitch-up snares before walking another five hundred yards away to a grove of willow trees. Once she's hidden in one of the trees, I jump down silently and inspect her snares. Her exceptional skills with snares confirm what I already concluded. She set excellent traps, ones designed to ensnare the prey and hoist them a little ways off the ground away from predators. Too bad she set them in the quietest part of the woods. Even with my enhanced senses, I haven't heard any sounds from prey; the owls and other nocturnal hunters have scared them into their nests. But I feel bad for the girl in the willow tree, so I pull a fat rabbit out of my game sack and string it up to the snare. She won't notice the trick, just the rabbit.

I hurry back into the trees before another tribute can show up. After climbing as high as necessary, I settle in a secure fork in the upper branches of the massive maple tree and begin skinning some of my kills. With a few quick tears, I rip the white furry coat off one of the rabbits into three big pieces. I sear the meat with the energy in my hands, which is as effective as a fire but doesn't produce any tell-tale smoke. Even if I built a fire, night has fallen now, and it's too dark for the tributes or Gamemakers to see any smoke. I finish three squirrels, a wild turkey, and two rabbits before I finally feel full enough to stop. I gather up the bones and skins and feathers and run a few hundred yards away before tossing them to the ground. It's only after the leftovers have left my hands that I wonder if the Gamemakers stocked these woods with bears.

Through the darkness I can see the girl from before, tucked in a black sleeping bag and strapped to a branch of the willow. She's lucky to have that sleeping bag; the temperature dropped at the same time the sun did. The other tributes will have to worry about keeping warm, but she may get to sleep. Even I'm feeling a little chilly, but that may be due to the fact that I'm still wearing only a pair of shorts. I collect my bag with the remaining game and decide that my first priority while I'm stuck in the arena is to obtain some clothes.

As soon as I make this decision, the anthem of Panem blares and the seal of the Capitol appear in the sky, preceding the death recap. Every night the headshots of the tributes that died during the day are shown to the tributes in the arena and the viewers at home. Actually, the people at home watch complete coverage and commentary of the killings, but this gives an unfair advantage to the living tributes in the arena, so we'll only see the tributes' photographs with their district number posted in the corner. I stop to watch the slideshow of the eleven dead children.

The first photo shows the girl from District 3, which means the Career tributes from 1 and 2 have all survived. Second is the boy from 4. One of the Careers, but I didn't see him with the pack at the Cornucopia. Next the boy from District 5, both tributes from 6 and 7, the boy from 8, the boy and girl from 9, and the girl from 10 appear on the screen for a few fleeting seconds then disappear. Those are the children who died today. Those are the children the Capitol killed. As the Capitol seal fades, I stare at where the faces emerged in the sky with my arms crossed over my chest.

I never liked the Hunger Games. I never enjoyed seeing children forced to kill each other for sheer entertainment. But I watch them every year to remind myself what I am fighting for, who I am fighting for. I fight to liberate the districts from the Capitol's oppression and destroy the utopia built on their suffering.

I remember when I was younger wishing I could do something to stop the children from dying, to stop the Games. I thought that when I was bigger, I would use my abilities for something good. I'd use them to stop the Capitol and save the tributes. But being in the arena with them reveals to me just how powerless I am—genetic enhancements or no. Every image on the screen is like a stinging slap in the face because I know now that the only way I'm leaving the arena is after all but one of those kids are dead.

After a while I spur myself into action. I've stayed here too long, and I still need to look for clothes. I pick up my game bag and count the rest of the meat that's in there. I have five squirrels, three wild turkeys, and two rabbits left, which should last through the next two days. I tie the sack up and allow myself one last look at the tribute in the willow tree. For reasons unknown, I fervently hope that the next time I see her face is not when it's her photograph floating in the sky.


End file.
